Tag: writing

November 2012 Writers’ Group Speaker – Joe Hurka and #ROW80

by Linda Nelson, posted in ROW80, works in progress, writing

November 17th I attended the Monadnock Writers’ Group meeting at the Peterborough, NH library. We meet every third Saturday and we are visited by a guest speaker, except the December and June meetings. These two meetings are set aside for the Members Read Around. This is where the members read a ten minute excerpt from their own works, so they can hear and share their voice with the group.

This month our guest speaker was Joe Hurka. He is an interesting writer. His first published work was a memoir which he wrote while his father was still alive. Fields of Light: A Son Remembers His Heroic Father, won the Pushcart Editors’ Book Award.

Fields of Light takes place during the era of war between communism and democracy, during a time of Hitler and World War II. It is a tale of espionage and heroic feats by a man who has since left our world.

Joe has published several other titles as well. Some of these titles are short stories published in literary quarterlies like Ploughshares, Agni Review Dos Passos Review and numerous others.

Before, which is published by Thomas Dunne Books is his only fictional novel.

He shared with us his experience with St. Martin’s Press, how one bad review made the publishing house drop the marketing of his book all together without notifying him that they were going to do this.

When a member asked about his writing process he offered up his thoughts on the matter. “Even when you are in a slump and you are doing nothing but staring at the screen you are still writing, believe it or not. The brain and the consciousness are still at work creating the story that must be shared with the world. It is its destiny to be told.”

 

 

ROW80 Update:

Yea! I finally got to the end of the story. Now for the rest of the month and part of next month I can begin working on the edit of Road Salt. I am so looking forward to publishing this story. It has been like writing a homework assignment but I think it will be well worth the pain and suffering my characters are going through. They will all be able to look forward to their appearance in their own stories in the rest of the series and each one will finally have their happy ending as they enter recovery.

I have named the series Wings from Ashes as each of the characters has burned the bridges in their lives to their family and friends while they struggle with the different phases of substance abuse and addiction.

Friends of Choice is the first book in this series and was written two years ago. My characters are still making the bad choices in their lives, but many others like themselves make the same mistake over and over again before getting what life is all about.

During the edit process there will be scene building with the missing description I so hate to divulge in and then there is the character building and I plan on doing a lot of that with this story.

So if I do not see you here on this loop, have a Happy Thanksgiving.

 

Stop by the Linky to see how the other ROW80’ers are doing…

Speaker at the Bow Meeting #ROW80 #RWA

by Linda Nelson, posted in ROW80, writing, writing and poetry

Yesterday I became officially hooked into the Romance Writers World. That’s right, now I am a member of the NH Chapter too. This is a good thing. They are such a great bunch of gals and fun to be around and full of great information. They meet at the Baker Free Library in Bow, NH on the second Saturday of the month.

We had a speaker visit us at the meeting yesterday. This is one of the great benefits of attending a local writing group meeting. Next weekend I will be attending the meeting at the Monadnock Writers’ Group at the Peterborough Library on Saturday. They too will have a speaker.

Our guest was Kristan Higgins and wow what a speaker!

 

She is the author of 9 bestselling – 9 mind you – romances. She is also funny, witty, and full of great information. I see she has a blog too. http://kristanhiggins.com/blog/

So yesterday she left us with some tidbits on writing. These bits would probably work for almost any type of fictional writing and not just Romances.

The title of her presentation was Chapter One – I am born

Kristan explained to us how the first chapter is the most important chapter in any story. It is the chapter that gets the reader to keep coming back for more. It is your hook. So here is a condensed version of some of her tidbits.

  1. “Wicked Awesome First Line”
  2. Tone – Funny, Tragic, Terrifying, Elegant – “Don’t mislead your reader by writing a funny opener and having a tragic ending.”
  3. Theme – “What is your Book about?” – Show what your Character does not know.
  4. Personality – Demonstrate through action – “Beware of the cliché in character development – Create a Character the reader can relate to. “Romances are about the Character.”
  5. Character’s beliefs is somewhere stated
  6. Everyday life & World – where the story takes place and how things work in the character’s world. If the character has emotional scars, give glimpses and let the readers use their own imagination.
  7. Keep the first chapter Lean and only include the key players of the story.
  8. Seeds of the past – Flash backs, but don’t tell the reader EVErything.
  9. Immediate Goal
  10. Character Flaw – “why she doesn’t have what she wants just yet.”
  11. Character in Action – “Don’t have the character just sit there doing nothing. Create some disturbance or conflict, hooking into the emotions of the character so the reader can relate to them.
  12. The Hook – Last line of the chapter and its job.
  13. Call to the Adventure – Why life can’t continue to be the same after what has taken place in the first chapter.
  14. “The last chapter of the story should echo the first chapter.”

Then she gave us a list of NO – No’s

  1. Flash back – sometimes okay if used properly
  2. Dreams
  3. Secondary Plot lines
  4. The next four heroes & heroines in your series – keep them out of the picture as best as you can and don’t let them steal the show.
  5. Overt revelations
  6. Grocery list of descriptions
  7. Prologues can sometimes be allowed if they are very important to the story. But don’t give away the trump card.

 

At our meeting we have a Pro Liaison and she is great at giving us writing challenges to take us through the month. They are more like exercises to help us get out of the way of our muses. This month’s challenge is to write crap for 5 minutes every day to kill your inner critic.

Okay – I found an outlet for my crap writing. I have this manuscript I started in 2010 for NaNo and never finished it because I thought the story line was crap – Maybe something can happen with it and I can shape it after I finish writing the crap in the first draft. Yesterday I did 500 words in the five or so minutes I worked on it. Who know what could happen with this story.

 

ROW80:

This week was a blah week. I was sick and didn’t feel like doing much of anything but sleeping. I even missed a day of work from my everyday job. It isn’t like me to call in sick.

I’m feeling better, and yesterday I was able to pick up some motivation from the girls at the Bow meeting. So yeaH! I added another 1k words to Road Salt. The first draft isn’t anywhere near the word count I am seeking but at least the story line is over 2/3rds done. I can see the end of the story off in the distance.

After what I did with the revision on Witch Book I am sure I will be able to make my word count when I go back and add some fluff to the story. I tend to do the opposite of most writers. I write tight and have to force myself to add the stuff our imaginations are made of.

Have a great week and may the ROW be with you… If you have time come check out some other ROWers and cheer them on Linky List.